I like challenges. A club mate, a former 40K player now enjoying historics, bought a dirt cheap 2nd hand painted Waterloo army which was cheap because it was so ugly. Black primer. Very basic block paint. Blob. Splash. Ready. No wash. No shadow. No depth. Hobgoblin brown skin colour. Outdated sculpts. Probably painted with enamel of low quality paint. Much below tabletop quality.

I gave zombie hordes a spark of life with the now out-of-fashion Army Painter dipping technique. So I offered my friend to take his hobgoblins home and turn them into proper tabletop quality soldiers.

60 figures. I didn’t repaint them, I only drybrushed a very simple highlight on coat and trousers and corrected the skin colour. Within two hours the army was ready for Army Painter Strong Tone. Two minutes per soldier.

Here’s the same army after the dip.

No, it’s not perfect. I can still see blots, dots, spots, stains and mistakes. But the soldier below is the same soldier as the soldier above, and it’s not the same soldier anymore. He will be a proud defender of his side of the table, in tabletop quality, and if a vain contrast painted French hussar will ever attack him, mr Army Painter will fight until his last drop of varnish…